Good Universe At Your Next Door » Technology

How To Market To Technology Innovators, Part 1

admin — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 01:03:49 +0000

If there’s one marketing model every high-tech marketing manager should know, it’s the Technology Adoption Life Cycle (TALC). The TALC is the paradigm that describes their prospects’ mindsets your sales staff is likely to encounter as they market your products and services. And it all begins with the technologists themselves: the Innovators.

Innovators are the first market you’re likely to encounter when marketing high technology products and services. These are the people highlighted in the far left-hand side of the curve you see above. They love to be the first ones to jump on a new technology. And for good reason: they’re technologists, themselves.

These technology enthusiasts sometimes go by other names. Things like “techie,” “computer-nerd,” or “propeller-head.” They’ll appreciate your technology product simply because it’s cool. Oh, and if it happens to have an advantage over what they’re using now, so much the better.

As Geoffrey Moore says in his landmark book, “Crossing The Chasm,”?

“They Innovators will forgive your ghastly documentation, horrendously slow performance, ludicrous omissions in functionality, and bizzarely obtuse methods of invoking some needed function – all in the name of moving technology forward.”

You have to market to innovators before you can get the attention of the early adopters. And it’s a good thing: these guys are technology savvy enough to give the early adopters the thumbs-up.

So by all rights, this group should be a pretty easy one to market to. Yet I see high-tech companies miss the boat all the time when marketing to them.

B2B Copywriting: Getting Innovators’ Attention

Innovators care about technology issues first. If they care about business issues at all (admittedly, few do) they weigh in at a very distant second. So business benefits won’t get an innovator’s attention.

What will get his attention is new technology – “new” is the operative word. They want to be the first to get a new widget that accomplishes something cool that has never been done before. They’re happy to sign your non-disclosure agreement, as long as they can be among the first to get their hands on your widget.

Innovators have the most advanced brains in the company (really, they do), and they know it. So tell them so in your copy. Paint them a word picture of themselves being part of an exclusive group of advanced engineers who truly appreciate what your breakthrough technology means to the unsuspecting world.

One other thing about innovators: they know they have to live within the confines of corporate America. But that doesn’t mean they have to like it. Though they may not admit it outright, they have a sharp disdain for the “suits” who limit their creativity by demanding something so mundane as a return on investment.

In my next article, I’ll give you an example of direct response copy I’ve written to these Innovators that worked very well in the past. So watch for Part 2 in this series.

Consumer Demand Drives Development Of New DSL Technology

admin — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 01:03:49 +0000

Many Companies are making the investment to meet consumer demand for better and faster broadband internet service. New technologies are emerging that may soon put more zoom in your Internet connection

With ever growing demand for better and faster access to the internet by consumers, major technology companies are rushing to develop new technologies to meet these demands. But there have been problems along the way.

One of the first problems to be considered in developing new technology is the current infrastructure or currently available equipment on which broadband services are supplied. Most all DSL service in the world travels over standard phone line, which in most cases has been in place for many years. The lines are basically straight copper, in some cases there may be somewhat newer twisted pair copper lines, but none the less still pretty much standard copper telephone wire.

DSL was originally designed to be used over just such lines with the aid of line filtering, and has for the most part done its job very effectively. But with the increase in demand for high speed access, companies are finding it difficult to supply the increases in speed and reliability that consumers are demanding. One of the major limitations of DSL is travel distance. DSL looses speed and reliability the further away from the companies switching or exchange center. At the exchange, a digital subscriber line access multiplexer (DSLAM) terminates the DSL circuits and aggregates them, where they are handed off onto other networking transports. Ideally users need to be within 15,000 feet from the DSLAM server, using current copper line technology.

Other transport systems in many cases may well be fiber-optic lines that can handle thousands of times more bandwidth then can standard copper transmission lines. As companies upgrade systems, and more and more DSLAM terminals are supplied with fiber-optic access. DSL service to consumers will get better. The hope is of one day having fiber optic lines in place completely up to consumer use points, or in the home. To have a fiber optic infrastructure in place would open up vastly improved network connection abilities, but it isn’t something that will happen any time soon. Upgrading systems will take many years.

In 2004 a technology was developed by Texas Instruments that helped the world leap ahead onto the internet superhighway. The technology called Uni-DSL which means “One DSL for universal service” brought new elements to the world of DSL. Uni-DSL made it possible to add voice and video to data that could be transmitted effectively over a single digital subscriber line. It also helped local companies stream line their services while adding to the effectiveness of DSL service over all. VoIP or Voice over Internet Protocol was born of this new technology, as was on demand or live streaming video for the consumer

There are several competing forms of DSL, each adapted to specific needs in the marketplace. Some forms of DSL are widely used standards and some are proprietary. Due to existing infrastructure not all are available in all places. Each standard has its own unique equipment and protocol requirements. ADSL or Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line is the most common type in use today. Other types include SDSL or Symmetric DSL and VDSL referred to as Very High-Bit-Rate DSL. Both ADSL and VDSL have new technology associated with them that change their nomenclature slightly to ADSL2+ and VDSL2. These two technologies are both in use and are being further developed. Depending on who you talk to, ADSL2+ is the best for users with distances further then 3,000 feet from the DSLAM center and VDSL2 for those in the short run distances.

The focus now seems to be on the upstream side of Broadband access. With more and more people working from home, and more families communicating over the internet, it doesn’t take long to realize that although down stream speeds might be great, upstream or uploading information is still not meeting the consumer demand level.

If you have every tried to share a video from a camcorder with family members across the internet, you have probably noticed that it still isn’t as easy as you might like. The demand for upstream bandwidth has come to center stage and is a large part of what is driving today’s research and development.

But with every change, time is needed for it to filter into point of use. Every new protocol demands change in every aspect of how Broadband access is delivered to the consumer. From the program that needs to be written that will accommodate the new setups, the machinery that handles every aspect of the physical delivery system, to the modem you have that connects your computer to the internet. Everything needs to work together.

What will tomorrow bring for consumers in the way of Broadband access? Only tomorrow will tell. Some believe that we may have reached the limit of speed that can be achieved using existing infrastructure and until new fiber-optic lines are more readily available that speeds won’t improve much. Yet new ideas and technology are still being developed to help bring better internet access to the world over existing infrastructure.

Will there be fiber-optic lines in every home soon? Someday, most likely, but not in the very near future. At present it just isn’t cost effective for companies to implement the kind of changes needed to upgrade everyone to the latest and greatest types of DSL systems, but slowly as new systems are built and upgrades are made, where possible, fiber-optic cables are being put in place. With each upgrade, with each new system structure built, the goal of fiber-optic lines in every home becomes more of a reality for us all.

So is the DSL connection that you have now as fast as it will get? Today, maybe yes, but most assuredly the future will improve it, and who knows, tomorrow may be the day.
More DSL information at http://myfreedomdsl.com

Shopping Smart: Using Technology To Simplify Market Research

admin — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 01:03:49 +0000

Every time you’re out-at the mall or in a store-you see ideas for great products you can sell through your e-business. But before you decide whether a product is worth pursuing, you have to determine if you can compete with it. That requires performing some market research to understand what the market will bear. And that is what makes http://Frucall.com’s free, phone-based service a valuable resource, not just to shoppers, but also to Online Sellers looking for information on prospective products.

If you see a product you’re interested in selling, you can call from any phone (including cell phones) and instantly find out exactly who your competition is and what kind of price you can expect to get for that item. Not only is the service free, it’s also extremely user-friendly-your phone doesn’t even have to be internet enabled!

How Does It Work?

When you see a product you’re interested in selling, you simply dial a toll-free number, 888-363-7822, and enter the product barcode. Frucall’s system searches most of the major online aggregators, and through your voice portal, you get the top three merchants listed. Those aggregators include Amazon, YahooShopping, http://Shopping.com, StreetPrices, and Google. So your results represent hundreds of thousands of online merchants.

Explains Tony Milner, Frucall’s Vice President of Marketing, “It’s a free comparison shopping service you can use from any cell phone. There are no downloads, no hardware or software requirements-anyone can use it.” So basically, you can shop online from anywhere-without actually going online!

What’s the Benefit to Me, as an eBiz Owner?

The consumer benefits of a service like this are obvious. But eBiz owners can also benefit tremendously. There are two primary advantages to using Frucall for Online Sellers:

?Market Research just got a whole lot easier. In a matter of seconds, you can find out if it’s worth your time to look into a product any further. Not only can you do quick pricing research, but you can also get product ratings from services like Amazon. This is particularly useful when you need to compare the quality of similar products with similar prices. And every search you save is automatically updated, so each time you click on an item, you’re getting the most current information.

?You have a highly targeted advertising opportunity. Frucall’s system supports advertising, so you’re getting your message to consumers searching for exactly what you sell, at the moment in time when they’re looking to make that purchase. If they like what they hear, they can choose to buy your product right then and there. This is focused advertising-if your ad appeals to the caller, more than what they see in the store, you’ve just made a sale.

Whether you’re looking to expand your reach to new buyers, or grab fast facts on potential products for your eStore, taking advantage of this unique service can empower you to run your business that much more efficiently. Says Milner, “Think of Frucall as a comprehensive personal shopping assistant in your pocket or purse? The searchable database offers the best online prices of millions of items-the best way to experience it is to give it a try!”

Small Firms Get The Most Out Of Your Technology – Actively Manage It

admin — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 01:03:49 +0000

Your technology infrastructure is the hardware, software and people that support your business. So, how can you get your technology investment to pay off for you? You have to manage it. Technology can make you more efficient and effective but only if you actively manage it.

To get the most out of your hardware, you must run it under optimal conditions. Ideally, hardware runs best in climate controlled areas. Generally speaking, temperatures under 75 degrees with 30 to 50% humidity is good for most computers. High heat and direct sunlight will cause a computer to run hot. Excessive heat will reduce the computer’s life expectancy over time.

Do you have dust and dirt around your computer’s fans? There are probably clumps of dust and dirt inside your computer, too. Excessive dirt and dust may contribute to a computer running hot also. That’s why it is important to take your computer outside at least once a year and blow out the inside with compressed air.

Maximizing your software investment is a little more complicated. First of all, you must find out what devices and applications require software updates. Updating software means you need a patch management system.

A patch management system is a routine that allows you to apply software updates to devices and applications systematically. Most people know that operating systems and antivirus and productivity software require updates. But did you know that your computer BIOS, firewalls, routers, switches, server raid arrays, and other hardware devices may require updates, too? Hardware devices run a type of software known as firmware. Firmware can be updated. Most firmware updates improve the overall performance of the device.

Keeping all these devices up to date can be a daunting task but a schedule can help you do it. For instance, update your firewalls, routers, and switches on the first Monday of every month. The second Friday of every month defragment your computer hard drives. Set a schedule for patch management and follow it.

You can provide your employees with bleeding edge technology. However, what good is the best technology if the user doesn’t have the ability to take advantage of it? You must ensure your employees have mastered work related technology to get the highest return on your technology investment. Your employees do the work. Your employees accomplish that work using technology.

How well does your employees use work related technology? Conduct some research to find out. First, go ask them about work related technology. Don’t take their responses for granted. Next observe them using technology. If you are satisfied with what you heard and observed then you can stop here. If not then take it a step further. Assess their ability to use it. The results may surprise you. If your firm is small then consider cross training each employee to perform all mission critical technology tasks. Finally, encourage your employees to use the technology.

You must actively manage your technology infrastructure to get your expected return on investment. Be sure to employ these tactics to help you manage it. Make sure your hardware runs in a clean, cool and humidified environment. Create a patch management system for your software assets and stick to it. Research, assess, train and cross train your employees to perform mission critical technology tasks.

The Virtual Private Server for You

admin — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 08:41:35 +0000

As you already knew, technology is increasing rapidly and you can find a lot of kinds of technology today. Now a day, technology really eases everyone’s life almost in every life aspect. If you have a business, the technology also can help you boost your business productivity and you also can use the technology to get more customers. Internet is one of the technologies that can help you gather the customers as quick as you can imagine and all you have to do just build a website.

If you want to build your own website, you should find the right web hosting server that has lots of benefits. You can find a lot of web hosting servers if you visit the internet. So, to ease you find the right web hosting, you should open Hostv.com. If you visit the website you can get vps hosting which becomes a favorite web hosting today. It has modern technology and you can get it with the most possible price. The virtual private server has the cPanel, server guard security, and more that you ca get for free.

When you look for the web hosting to support your business, vps hosting is the right answer for you so you can order it now and get the more customers. You can also consider video hosting if your website contains a lot of videos for easier access and load.

Satellite internet connection satisfying

admin — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:20:07 +0000

Activities of the internet as if nothing were out. Every day many people who use the Internet in a public place or in their homes each. They use the Internet connection for purposes different. Some use the Internet to visit the satellite sites social networking, to business, for marketing and also as a medium of information and communication. If you see the Internet functions as a medium of communication and information the Internet has certainly become an important part and so help make you to get information.

Make sure that you are well internet connection so you will get the data more accurate and faster. Comfort using the Internet is also determined by the smoothness of an internet connection. Therefore, although many people who is using the internet, but not all people get a smooth connection in accordance with the wishes. This would not be experienced by users Hughes net broadband internet as a service that offers a satellite Internet connection is smoother and faster. You will get a satisfaction with the quality owned this internet satellite. In addition, these providers also offer the best Satellite Internet service is always ready to serve its customers for any complaints. Make sure you have selected the most appropriate service for an internet connection

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Distance Learning Technologies Comparisons

admin — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 01:03:49 +0000

There are many ways to take part of distance learning these days, and even more technologies to choose from. How can you compare the different companies offering distance learning technology? Be sure to comparison shop before you put any money down. This will save you a lot of time and hassle. This article covers a few considerations when making distance learning technologies comparisons for your needs.

When comparing distance learning programs, you should consider your capabilities. Are you using high speed internet? If not, many of the functions and tools of the latest technologies will not be available to you. Therefore, they may not be worth paying for. However, if you have a high speed connection from which you can do your learning, you can take advantage of the great new tools available. Also, computer hardware is a consideration. If you’re running an older computer, you may not be able to get streaming video to work efficiently, even with a high speed connection. Some of the material may come on DVD’s, so you would need to have a DVD player as well (regular CD players cannot play DVD’s). Check with different services and find out which is right for your hardware setup.

Another point to consider when making distance learning technologies comparisons is the time you’re willing to commit. Distance learning programs are under the assumption that you can and will keep up with the program. Without working on your own and without have a teacher to direct your learning, you will be responsible for taking the initiative on the work and keeping up with the class. Though this gives you flexibility, it also requires a bit more discipline than a conventional classroom.

So, be sure to take the time to figure out if you will be able to fully utilize the distance learning program you’re looking to buy. If you find the wrong program, you won’t get the full benefit and will likely feel like you’ve wasted your money. But, if you find the right program for you, you’ll have found a great way to learn something new with the flexibility of learning and working from home.

Glaring Modern Web site Technologies

admin — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 01:03:49 +0000

Well, to soothe your brain muscles, lessen the wrinkling of your forehead and the frequency of troubled sleep, here are some web site technologies that you can bank on to effectively promote your business or company to your advantage.

Client Side and Servers Side are the two kinds of technologies used in web sites. Client Side means that the processing of the technology is done in the web browser. Server Side, on the other hand, is done by the web server.

Client Side technologies use HTML, XHTML and CSS in creating fabulous web sites which are similar to most of the sites you are enjoying now.

HTML is short for Hyper Text Markup Language. A series of ‘tags’ is used in designing through HTML. This technology is used by labeling text so that the computer can understand what it means and what it wants. To accentuate a word, say to make the phrase ‘World Wide Web’ bold, the right tag is – World Wide Web. The result of which is this – World Wide Web. In order to come up with a whole site, series of apt tags is a requisite.

HTML was created by Tim-Berners-Lee in the year 1990. Lee’s creation was acknowledged by the W3C or the World Wide Web Consortium.

After HTML came XHTML. The latter is short for eXtended Hyper Text Markup Language. Experts in web design services are predicting that XHTML will constitute a big part of the World Wide Web’s future. The project of the W3C called “The Semantic Web” will be using more of XHTML as well as other latest technologies. This will bring about further modern anticipated changes.

CSS is another essential web technology. Cascading Style Sheets or CSS was created by W3C. It is one of the most user-friendly technologies that show what the text is and how it should be displayed in the page. It directs designers on how to control documents and present them visually in different mediums. This is an example of how to use it – font-family:Arial, sans-serif. This is used to make the web browser use Arial font. If Arial is not available, then the default will be sans-serif font.

To have a clearer grasp about web technologies such as HTML, XHTML and CSS, you can subscribe to online tutorials. If not, read some of the articles related to them. Make your web site design services functional and dynamic.

Make it happen.

Bayesian Filter: Technology And Advantages

admin — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 01:03:49 +0000

Not a long time ago, most anti-spam products simply used a list of keywords to identify spam. A good set of keywords could catch much spam. However, a keyword-based anti-spam filter requires manual updating and can be easily fooled by tweaking the message a little. Spammers simply examine the latest anti-spam techniques and find ways to bypass them. At the result you’re left with a high number of false positives.

The need in a new effective technique to fight against spam stood up. The experience showed that this new method might adapt itself to the spammers’ tactics that would change with time.

The Bayesian filtering is based on the principle that most events are dependent and that the probability of an event occurring in the future can be inferred from the occurrences of this event in the past. This approach is used to identify spam. If some piece of text occurred mostly in spam emails but not in legitimate mail, then it would be reasonable to suppose that this email is probably spam.

To filter mail using the Bayesian technology, you need to generate a database of words collected from spam and legitimate mail. Then a probability value is assigned to each word; the probability is based on the calculations that take into account how often that word occurs in spam as opposed to legitimate mail.

After the legitimate and spam databases are created during an initial training period, the word probabilities can be calculated and the Bayesian filter is ready for use. When a new mail arrives, it is broken into words and the most significant words are singled out. From these words, the Bayesian filter calculates the probability of a new message being spam or not. If the probability is greater than a spam threshold, say 0.9, the message is classified as spam.

Tip! G-Lock SpamCombat allows you assign the hot keys to the common operations. For example, you can assign F8 to Mark Message as SPAM function and F9 to Mark Message as Clean. Next time when you train the Bayesian filter you can simply use two keys on your keyboard F8 and F9.

It is important to note that the analysis of spam and legitimate mail is performed on the mail the particular user (organization, company, etc.) receives, and therefore the Bayesian filter is adjusted to this particular person, company, or organization. For example, a financial institution may receive a lot of emails with the “mortgage” word and would get a lot of false positives if using an outdated anti-spam filter. The Bayesian filter analyzes the entire message with the word “mortgage”, and concludes whether this email is spam or legitimate basing NOT only on a single keyword “mortgage”. The Bayesian approach to filter spam is highly effective – spam detection rates of over 99.7% can be achieved with a very low number of false positives!

Let’s summarize what benefits we get using the Bayesian filter to catch spam:

1) Much more intelligent approach because it examines all aspects of a message, as opposed to keyword checking that classifies a mail as spam on the basis of a single word.

2) Self-adapting – constantly learning from new spam and new valid inbound mails, the Bayesian filter evolves and adapts to new spam techniques.

3) Sensitive to the user ? it learns the email habits of the company and understands that, for example, the emails with the “mortgage” word are not always spam.

4) Multi-lingual and international – being adaptive it can be used for any language. The Bayesian filter also takes into account certain languages deviations or the diverse usage of certain words in different areas, even if the same language is spoken.

5) Difficult to fool, as opposed to a keyword filter – an advanced spammer who wants to trick the Bayesian filter can either use fewer words that usually indicate spam, or more words that generally indicate valid mail (such as a valid contact name, etc). Doing the latter is impossible because the spammer would have to know the email profile of each recipient – and a spammer can never hope to gather this kind of information from every intended recipient.

Combating Computer Espionage

admin — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 01:03:49 +0000

In some cases, spies and covert operations are found in war grounds or politically tense regions. Now however, you can find spies and covert operations running undetected within your personal computer system as you use your computer and the Internet.

Have you noticed a suspicious slow down of your computer’s processing without any particular reason? Are you bombarded by unsolicited pop up ads that indiscriminately appear whether you are running a program or not? These symptoms may continue to happen despite checking your system and running your recently updated anti virus program to run diagnostics on your computer.

Unless you run the correct program, you will not be able to detect the real problem in your system: spyware and adware.

Adware are unsolicited programs that usually come bundled with freeware or shareware. Yes, sometimes things that seem to be good to be true usually come with unwanted invisible strings attached. Companies usually pay freeware or shareware creators to be able to capitalize and prey on unsuspecting individuals who download these programs. Adware cause unsolicited pop up advertisements in your computer and in severe cases, adware causes pop up advertisements to pop up soon as you boot your system http://www.loss1.com

Spyware on the other hand is more covert and usually undetected in your system until you run an anti spyware program. Spyware is used exactly to spy on you. In relatively mild cases, spyware is used to track your Internet browsing habits so that the spyware can report your preferences to build a marketing profile. This means that as you go about your Internet business, you are under surveillance and your basic right to privacy is impinged upon.

In severe cases though, certain spyware better labeled as malware, are used for criminal purposes and can steal keywords and other sensitive information based on your computer and Internet usage.

For instance, malware can take note of your keystrokes or take note of your credit card number and other vital information that can be used to steal your identity and generally put your security at risk.It is said that 9 out 10 computers are infected with spyware and to make sure that you are not part of statistical majority, you need run an adware and spyware cleaner to detect unwanted security and privacy breach within your system.

There are a lot of reliable adware and spyware cleaners in available to remove these unwanted programs in your computer. You must note however that some adware and spyware are intricately bundled within their parent programs that cleaning them out from your computer will inadvertently disable the legitimate programs they infect. This consequence is a necessary evil to clean your computer of unwanted adware and spyware. You should choose an adware and spyware cleaner that can also work proactively by preventing future accidental installation of these nuisances.

Adware and spyware cleaners work like your anti virus programs except that these particular cleaners target adware and spyware.Considering the trouble adware and spyware creators take to ensure that extracting installed adware and spyware from your computer system will be difficult, the adage about an ounce of prevention being worth more than a pound of cure applies in this situation. Be sure to install a reliable and secure adware and spyware cleaner in your system to remove existing security and privacy risks as well as preventing future hassle.

Good Universe At Your Next Door » Technology

How To Market To Technology Innovators, Part 1

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